Financial Hardship

The first thing you need to do is to review your current financial situation. Write down your income streams, then create a list of your weekly, fortnightly, monthly, and yearly expenditures.

Your debts could be such things as bills, loans, or credit card debt. Don’t forget the big yearly items such as car registration, insurances, or recurring payments for appointments that you need to keep.

There are many free resources on the internet to help you get started with making your budget such as the free online budget planner on Australian Government website Moneysmart.com.au.

Work out how much you need to save each pay cycle to cover your bills, and with the remaining amount, workout a savings and spending budget. Prioritise necessities such as groceries and fuel before putting money aside for discretionary spending.

You may have heard of the term ‘lifestyle creep’, but if you haven’t, let us explain. Essentially, the lifestyle creep happens when your income increases. A person might start to regularly spend money on things they might not have thought about when they were on a lower income. Examples of succumbing to lifestyle creep could be having your car regularly detailed, purchasing a new outfit for every occasion, buying your lunch whilst at work every day, or choosing a higher priced phone plan.

Can any of these non-essential expenses be cut back on, removed entirely, or paid off faster? In some instances, you may be able to reduce your phone plan or electricity plan, cancel a streaming service, or reuse or recycle items you already own.

The Mutual Bank defines Financial Hardship as the difficulty in meeting the repayments on your loans, debts, bills, and other financial obligations. If you are unable to make a repayment, please contact our Member Services Team on 1300 688 825.

It is a period of time (usually up to six months) where you have arranged for your regular loan repayments to be deferred to allow you to get on top of your finances. During this time, interest will continue to be charged on your loan, however any late payment penalties will be waived. The repayments deferred will be recalculated back into remaining term of the loan. This may result in your monthly repayments increasing upon the expiry of the deferral period.

Before the loan deferral expires, we will get in touch to review your position and to discuss whether you are in a position to recommence loan repayments. If you are, we will remind you of your monthly repayment amount, and assist with setting up automatic payments depending on your pay cycle. If your financial position has not improved, we may request a meeting with you to again review your full financial position and discuss your options moving forward.

Yes, they apply to all loans including owner occupied and investment home loans, personal loans, business loans and credit cards.

An Interest Only repayment option for financial hardship purposes is usually provided for a term of up to twelve months. This may result in your monthly repayments increasing upon the expiry of the interest only period.